Tuesday, February 25, 2014

(AFR) - Over the past three months, Ukrainian protesters have occupied Kyiv’s Independence Square. They’re demanding closer ties to the European Union, changes to the constitution, and an altering of the government’s power structures. There’ve been recent, violent clashes, with hundreds of people killed by government forces and protesters in the past few weeks. Orthodox and Catholic priests have courageously ministered to both protesters and government forces. The protests have been framed by many Western media as a “Russia versus the West or European Union” conflict.

To help all of us sort through this volatile crisis, Ancient Faith Radio’s Kevin Allen interviewed His Eminence Metropolitan Antony, Primate of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church of the United States. Transcript available here.

2 comments:

Ancient faith radio has also uploaded an interview from a different perspective of Met. Anthony. I hope you will post this as well. http://www.ancientfaith.com/podcasts/features/ukraine_another_perspective

As a Ukrainian Orthodox Christian it is good to see our fellow Orthodox in the USA supporting democracy in Ukraine:03-03-2014http://risu.org.ua/en/index/all_news/orthodox/orthodox_world/55551/Open Letter to Patriarch Kirill from Orthodox Clergy and Faithful in U.S. Regarding Conflict Between Russia and Ukraine2 March 2014, Forgiveness Sunday

To His Holiness Kirill Patriarch of Moscow and All Russia

Your Holiness, On the Sunday of Forgiveness, we, the clergy and faithful representing different Orthodox jurisdictions in the United States, are asking you to influence the normalization of the situation in Crimea and the restoration of peace between Russia and Ukraine. The intervention of the Russian Army on the territory of Ukraine is an act of military aggression, which increases ethnic tensions between Russians and Ukrainians. We beseech you, while there is still time, to demand from the President Vladimir Putin to withdraw the Russian troops from the territory of Ukraine, including the Crimean peninsula, in order to prevent bloodshed. Let the peoples of Ukraine and Russia hear the Russian Orthodox Church’s prophetic call to peace, love and mutual forgiveness.

Asking for your Archpastoral blessings,

1. Rev. Dn. Dr. Paul Gavrilyuk, Orthodox Church in America, Aquinas Chair in Theology and Philosophy, University of St. Thomas, Saint Paul, Minnesota.

The below is a huge blow to the idea of a united, canonical Orthodox Church in America. When ROCOR declared that they didn't want to be ...

"The World is trying the experiment of attempting to form a civilized but non-Christian mentality. The experiment will fail; but we must be very patient in awaiting its collapse; meanwhile redeeming the time: so that the Faith may be preserved alive through the dark ages before us; to renew and rebuild civilization, and save the World from suicide."